


The Drought and Letting Go

by compo67



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Brother Feels, Foreshadowing, Gen, Inspired by Poetry, Life on the Road, Light Angst, M/M, Melancholy, POV Dean Winchester, Pre-Stanford, Summer, Teenagers, can be read as wincest, seasons anthology
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-17
Updated: 2018-02-17
Packaged: 2019-03-20 10:39:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,279
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13715934
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/compo67/pseuds/compo67
Summary: The summer before the drought, Dean floats on a neon pink inner tube, nestled on a portion of the Mississippi River. He rests on the brink of a river, in more ways than one.  [Part of the Seasons Supernatural Anthology: Summer Theme.]





	The Drought and Letting Go

**Author's Note:**

> poem: "Duende" by Tracy K Smith

[This work appears in the Seasons: Supernatural Fan Fiction Anthology.]

 

The summer before the drought, Dean floats on a neon pink inner tube, nestled on a portion of the Mississippi River. 

John said something about being careful. It reminded Dean of every time John justified vegetable toppings on pizzas as healthy additions to their diets. Full of care means Dean keeps the occasional eye open behind his sunglasses and listens for anything that might be more than a frog or errant fish. Maybe the Mississippi is exciting in other states, but in Iowa, it might as well be a large puddle. 

Sam sits on the bank, dirty and sweating, determined to finish studying. They had sparring practice this morning, under John’s inscrutable supervision. What would most folks do passing through McGregor, Iowa? Explore the culture of early Americans by visiting the Effigy Mounds National Monument? Go for a leisurely stroll down the Wine Trail and sip chardonnay? Maybe tour the Spook Cave and search for the supposed alligator inside? 

Those were some of Sam’s suggestions. That and going to the run-down bookstore in what people have the audacity to call downtown McGregor. 

Of course, in the grand tradition of their nomadic, vagrant livelihoods, John forbade any sightseeing--if anyone could call it that. Orders were handed out and expected to be followed. Sparring, lunch, cleaning weapons and performing inventory on ammo, laundry, dinner, then bed. 

With an itinerary like that, who needs downtown McGregor? 

Dean settles into his inner tube. He borrowed it from a pair of ladies who seemed to be too fond of the Iowa Wine Trail. They were sleeping off their liquid breakfast when Dean seized the opportunity to allow himself the pleasure of the Mighty Mississippi. 

Some fathers and sons might take advantage of the river and go fishing. They might bond over a cooler of beer while the father passes down pearls of wisdom that will one day become his legacy. He might tell his sons stories about steamboats and downpours and spring meltwaters and cargo traffic. This fictional father would speak in measured, steady sentences, his care and concern audible. 

With a sigh, Dean pushes his sunglasses up and hollers at his brother. 

“You planning on pulling out that stick up your ass and having any fun this summer?” 

Sam makes a face, one only a seventeen-year-old can make. The intense summer sun causes Sam to squint. He’s been in a beanpole bad mood since the motel with the hamster theme--six motel themes ago. 

“Some of us,” Sam snaps, “are trying to improve ourselves.”

“Boring. Capital B.” 

“No one asked you, Dean.” 

“No one’s got to. I said it’s boring.”

“Yeah? Well, what do you care? No one’s forcing you to read books with words.”

“I can read.”

“Whatever.”

Dean dips his right hand into the water and briefly wishes he could change into a minnow. This is the third longest river system in the world. He could disappear fast and quick. Two thousand miles of river are all he needs. 

“The hell are you reading, anyway?” 

There was no point in trying to graduate high school. Dean didn’t see the point. He struck a deal with John--drop out, help out with hunts, and then act like a civilian and get his GED.

That was the most practical advice John had ever given him, all while cleaning his gun after a harpy hunt.

Sam stands up. His eyes are fresh and bright like the riverfront. But his face and clothes closely resemble the windows of their McGregor Inn motel room--smudged, dirty, and scraped. Dean doesn’t look much better. The last time Dean was squeaky clean was at that cowboy-themed motel, ten motels ago. 

“Riots,” Sam calls out. “I’m reading about riots.”

The hunts that require shouting--thankfully few and far between--pose the most difficult challenge to Sam. A naturally quiet person, he has learned to say his part and move on. If John or Dean don’t hear him, it’s not his fault, it’s theirs. Figures.

Dean wonders if he’s spoiled Sam. Not spoiled in a material sense, though, anyone who gets the last bowl of Lucky Charms might as well count themselves as such. But spoiled in a sheltered sense. 

“Alright, tell me about one.”

“Why?”

“Because.”

“Because why.”

“Don’t make me haul my ass out of this inner tube just to go kick yours.”

“I hope an alligator bites you.”

“Me too. Then I’ll turn into Gator Man and keep the town of McGregor safe from punks like you.”

Sam sits back down on the bank, knees pulled up to his chest. “What do you wanna know?” 

“Whatever you got.” 

“This riot started early morning of June 28th, 1969. It was between the New York City police and a group of civilians inside a bar.”

“I don’t remember bars being in that textbook.”

“You gonna listen or can I talk?”

“Sorry,” Dean murmurs. He motions for Sam to continue. 

With a deep breath, Sam’s voice carries from the bank to the river. “It was a raid. Like, the ladies said it happened all the time.” Sam looks up, shields his eyes from the sun. “They called them street queens.”

“Who?”

“Street queens. The ladies who started the riot.”

“Okay.”

“They just… snapped. People were getting shoved into paddy wagons, beaten up and treated like shit by the cops.” Bitterness seeps into Sam’s voice and anger rises. “So the street queens started fighting back. They threw rocks, bottles--whatever they could find. Chucked it all. The crowd exploded and took back the bar.”

Sam can make getting out of a lumpy motel bed sound like an act of heroism and bravery. The weight and reverence he attaches to pieces of history and observations of their lives adds to his years. It gives him a maturity that simultaneously helps and hinders him. Most kids start to mature with the loss of their childhood idols--Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, the tooth fairy. 

All this loss--spurred by that .45 placed into his hands when he was scared of the thing in his closet--it bears down on his shoulders. 

It builds up.

Like a right hook to the face inside a crowded, violent bar.

Dean wants to shrug and say something stupid. He wants to snap at Sam to stop studying and sending his essays to correspondence school and quit filling in Scantrons with the pencils they swipe from police stations and motel check-in desks. 

He wants to fend off the drought looming in the distance, one that threatens even the Mighty Mississippi. 

He could say, “Sounds like a regular Saturday to me.” 

He doesn’t have a problem yelling during hunts or at any other time. That’s never been his issue. 

“I… I read this poem,” he grumbles, slipping out of the inner tube and into the tepid, tame water. He pushes his borrowed flotation device back towards shore. Water ripples around every trudge of his legs. “Senior year. Something like, ‘If I call it pain, and try to touch it with my hands, it lies still and the music thins. It carries me with it farther, to chords that stretch and bend. It races on, toward shadows where the world I know and the world I fear threaten to meet.’” 

Sam lets go of a breath he’d been holding. 

Back on land, wet and soaked from the waist down, Dean stands a foot away. He nods and exchanges Sam’s brief smile by bumping their shoulders and walking past, carrying the borrowed inner tube. 

“C’mon. Better get this back and work on shit.” 

Dean’s issue has always been letting go.

**Author's Note:**

> i can finally post this!!! :D
> 
> i wrote a little piece for the Seasons anthology. it was super difficult to write Sam and Dean in a gen + canon setting, but i did it! you can read this as wincest if you read between the lines, which i have no doubt that y'all will. <3 
> 
> more info can be found about the anthology at spnshortstories.tumblr.com.


End file.
